Source: The Canadian Press

The Toronto stock market could get a slight lift at the open from the energy sector amid rising crude prices and dealmaking in the Alberta oilpatch but those positives will contend with concerns about the state of the U.S. recovery.

The Canadian dollar lost a quarter of a cent to 94.47 cents US.

U.S. futures pointed to a negative open with the Dow industrial futures down 19 points to 9,663, the Nasdaq futures slipped 2.5 points to 1,732 while the S&P 500 futures lost 2.7 points to 1,021.5.

French energy giant Total SA is acquiring a bigger stake in Alberta’s oilsands industry through the purchase of UTS Energy Corp. (TSX:UTS) in a deal worth more than $1.5 billion. A subsidiary of Total will pay $3.08 per share cash. Besides the cash, shareholders of UTS would receive stock in SilverBirch Energy Corp. — a new publicly traded company being set up as part of the deal.

Oil prices gained ground after seven losing sessions in a row.

The August crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange moved ahead 31 cents to US$72.29 a barrel as traders look to weekly crude supply data for signs of recovering U.S. demand.

Oil investors will be mulling crude inventory levels announced by the American Petroleum Institute later Wednesday and the Energy Department’s Energy Information Administration on Thursday.

Analysts expect crude supplies to fall 3.5 million barrels, according to a survey by Platts, the energy information arm of McGraw-Hill Cos, while inventories of gasoline and distillates will likely rise.

Copper prices were unchanged with the September contract on the Nymex at US$2.97.

Gold prices fell for a second day. The August bullion contract in New York declined $8 to US$1,187.10 an ounce.

Stocks in Toronto and New York finished positive Tuesday due to bargain-hunting. But trading was cautious after a U.S. survey showed the services sector there was growing at a weaker pace, mostly because of concerns about a slowdown in the global economy.

Concerns are rooted in a series of disappointing American economic reports, including a dismal jobs report released last Friday, a slowdown in the Chinese economy and the European debt crisis.

Those concerns moved into Asia overnight where Japan’s Nikkei 225 stock average closed down 0.6%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 1.1% and Seoul’s Kospi lost 0.6%.

European bourses were weaker as Britain’s FTSE index of leading shares was down 0.7%, Germany’s DAX was 0.63% lower and France’s CAC-40 was off 0.79%.

In other corporate news, Colabor Group Inc. (TSX:GCL), a distributor of food and other products, reports its net profits for the fiscal second quarter more than doubled as the company benefited from acquired tax losses, offsetting a drop in revenues. The Montreal-area company earned $4.2 million or 20 cents a diluted share, compared with net earnings of $1.7 million or 12 cents a share for the same period a year earlier. Sales fell 13.6% to $245.2 million.

TransForce Inc. (TSX:TFI), Canada’s largest trucking company, says it has bought a new 52-door cross-dock terminal in Calgary to back the growth of the Montreal company’s subsidiary TST Overland Express in the region. Financial terms of the deal were not revealed.